A Secret Place
by TreeStar
Summary: Luffy has found a new secret place to train for piracy: at the top of a cliff! But when Luffy takes a tumble and no one knows where he is, he's in a world of trouble. Good thing Ace is always watching... Set in Fuschia when Luffy was seven.


Here's another story set ten years ago in East Blue. It focuses on Luffy and Ace as children. This is for **Night-Rose14** because she specifically asked for more 'ten years ago' oneshots and got my butt in gear to finish this. Thiswas originally titled under my profile as "We've Gotta do Something About That". Enjoy.

* * *

**_A Secret Place_**

Luffy, newly-turned seven, stood confidently at the top of the cliff.

Another day of training for his future career as a pirate was about to begin, and he felt good about this one. It was sunny and warm and little breezy that day, more so on the cliff-top, and Luffy liked the sun. It had been cloudy for the last week, so sun was a good omen, he felt. Plus the cliff-top wasn't that dirty because it was so rocky. No one would ever guess that this was his new training spot!

The little boy congratulated himself again on his excellent choice. Had he decided to train in the field (you know, the field that he was NOT doing his chores in right now), then he would have been knee-deep in muck already. _And an aspiring member of Shanks' crew should never be knee-deep in anything but gold, _he folded his arms and nodded decidedly to himself.

For the last five weeks straight, Luffy had been trying to use his new ability to stretch to break things. Big things like big branches off of trees and rocks… He hadn't made any progress so far. More than half the time when he swung at something, even something big, he would miss it altogether, and the rest of the time not a dent had been made. He hadn't even been able to break that big swinging branch off the tree in the neighbor's yard!

Well, that was partly because Ace had insisted that he wasn't allowed to train in ways that would make him a nuisance to the neighbors and a vandal… but if his big brother hadn't stopped him, Luffy was sure he could have done it, if he had just been able to get a good connecting hit in.

Luffy averaged to land about one in seven of the punches that he threw. Ace said it was deplorable, but then he wouldn't show Luffy what he had to do to better his aim. Luffy knew that his Nii-chan was just being stingy! Ace could lasso perfectly when _he_ was seven, and he _never_ missed a marble.

Luffy was seven _now_ and he couldn't even get a lasso to swing in his hand the right way without falling on him, and Luffy only hit one in three marbles (even though Luffy insisted that it was only because Ace's shooter was better than his was…).

Ohooo! But today it would all change. See, Luffy had figured it out. It wasn't that he wasn't _strong_ enough. It was that he wasn't _close_ enough to the thing he was trying to hit. If he started up close to the object he was trying to break, then he could put all of his power behind his attack. Nothing in nature would be able to beat him again! Nooo way!

He was psyched. He had talked himself into believing that if he could just prove to Shanks that he was strong and could be useful to him, the captain would see the former error of his ways, and invite the boy along wholeheartedly!

Luffy had been working so hard under this belief. So hard. And he knew that Shanks would be coming back soon, and that he was running out of time if he wanted to be on the next voyage out. So he had to get this right today. He had to. And he had absolute confidence in himself that he could.

A gust of wind came, and the boy ducked down a little so that he wouldn't be sucked over the edge of the cliff and onto the crags or into the sea below. That would be so scary…

As soon as the wind passed, though, he stood straight again and walked over to inspect a big flat-faced boulder.

It would do.

Taking only a couple steps back from it, Luffy pulled back his fist, and then let it fly!

It collided with the rock with a solid crack that probably would have shattered every bone in his arm had he not been blessed with the gift of a rubber body. Luffy clutched his aching fist to him with is other hand and dropped to his knees. Tears of pain welled up in his eyes that, after a moment, turned into tears of anger. "Why can't I do it!" He shouted at the rock, as though it were the boulder's fault that he wasn't strong enough to break it. He stood up, fury blocking common sense, and again punched the rock as hard as he could. He continued to shout. "Why can't I be stronger!" he punched it again. And again. And again. The slight differences in the rock surface dug into his small hand, tearing and gashing up the young baby-soft skin. "Why can't I be useful to him?"

He finally stopped punching and slid to his knees as tears flowed down his cheeks. His voice dropped to a sorrowful whisper, "…why won't Shanks take me with him?"

"That _was _pathetic."

Startled, Luffy turned toward the source of the voice… only to take a step back when his eyes fell on Calvin, the richest kid in Fuchsia, with three of his lackeys behind him. Calvin's whole family were snobby and believed themselves to be better than anyone else, and their son always got away with everything he did. So, like a true sophisticate, he used his power to bully all the kids smaller than him.

The three kids behind him were his friends, and the only people that his parents believed were good enough to play with their only son: Edmund, Linus, and Duncan. They were all well dressed in expensive looking, well-pressed jackets and knee-high black socks with shiny shoes that had brass buckles. Their hair was combed just-so and made wind-proof by lots of gel, their faces and hands spotless. They each smelled of perfumed soaps, and spoke with a haughty air of someone who believes they themselves are rich and successful, instead of the parents they mooch from. Believing farm-labor to be a trivial thing, these boys were each the children of well-to-do business owners, and got to travel quite a bit so that they could meet other rich snobs.

All of them were ten years old, and though they didn't have much brawn, they each had a good six inches on Luffy. Being upper-class, they also had the practiced advantage of traveling in numbers and being very mean-spirited.

At that moment, Luffy couldn't have contrasted from them more. He stood there glaring at the older boys in his dirty t-shirt and shorts. His feet were bare, his messy hair blowing in the breeze, his knuckles bleeding, and tear tracks ran down his dirt-smudged cheeks.

Having arrived at the clearing on the cliff at some point while Luffy was beating himself up, the older boys now stood in a half-formed ring, blocking the path back down to the village. It didn't take a genius to know that the little boy was in some trouble.

They started to advance on him. "Hey boys, check it out. It's the freak!"

The others snickered and closed in the ring a little as the forced Luffy backward. "Talking to rocks, huh?" Calvin nodded in mock appreciation before grinning wickedly, "Do they talk back?"

The others laughed at this, and Luffy clenched his fists again, gritting his teeth, "What do _you_ want?"

Calvin acted taken aback at the hostility that Luffy showed. "My! Someone sure is rude. It's a nice day, is all. So we came up here to our spot, where low and behold, we find you!" He continued his slow advance on the smaller boy, his friends right behind him, ready to back him up.

Luffy got a little confused, but it didn't take him long to figure out what Calvin was doing. "This isn't your spot. I didn't do anything wrong, and I can be here if I want to."

The boys behind Calvin laughed, and Calvin smirked over his shoulder to them for a moment, before turning to look past Luffy, out at the sea just beyond the cliff-edge that they were only a few feet from now. "No, you see… You really can't."

Luffy fumed at this, "CAN SO! I have a right to be here JUST as much as YOU do!"

Now they all laughed, looking him up and down in distaste.

Luffy, sensing that this was coming to a head, braced himself as Calvin continued. "You really don't get it, do you, freak? _You_…" he paused here… and then suddenly shoved Luffy backward with all his might.

Luckily Luffy was ready for it and only ended up about a foot behind where he had started, position unchanged. Calvin's eyes narrowed at seeing that his strength had been so ineffective. In anger he ran up to push him again, but Luffy took a swing at him. A swing and a miss, as his hand stretched past Calvin to be grabbed by two of the other boys, who stretched it farther. It didn't hurt at all, but it left Luffy wide open for a punch in the gut by Calvin. Luffy gasped and dropped, his ability to breathe completely stolen away from him.

"_You_ don't have a right to be _anywhere_." Calvin growled vehemently. "_You _don't _belong_ anywhe-." He was cut short when his friends behind him left go of Luffy's arm, and it came snapping back to smack him hard against the back of his head. Calvin lost his footing at this and fell into Luffy, pushing him backward and over the cliff.

…It all seemed to happen in slow motion to Luffy. One moment he was clenching his Solar Plexus as Calvin snarled at him, and the next his hand had snapped him backward… and he was falling, Calvin' stunned face watching him as he toppled back into empty space. Then even that disappeared from sight to be replaced by sky and jagged rock face. He knew the ocean was below him, and that if that didn't get him, the crags sticking up out of it would… and those five idiots up there would laugh about it.

And suddenly Luffy forgot he was even falling, a new realization coming to the forefront of his mind: _FIVE people?_

It had taken him a moment to process through the shock of falling, but just before his vision of the cliff-top was blocked out, he had seen four people moving around behind Calvin.

…And he suddenly knew that he was gonna be okay. Leastways he would be if he could meet his salvation halfway (for he knew who it had to be).

His brother would get rid of the bad guys, and Luffy would be saved if he could just stop his fall, so he stretched his arms and grabbed hold of one of the larger rocks sticking out of the cliff wall, and then pulled himself on top of it. It wasn't a big rock, and it was very rounded and almost like a small nose sticking out of the cliff-face. He had no freedom to move without risking a fall off the rock, so Luffy stayed as still as he could, and tried not to cry.

He couldn't hear what was happening above him, but knew that there was no way Ace could lose to a bunch of ninnies like them!

* * *

Up on the cliff, Calvin was still laying against the stone where he had fallen in a state of shock. He hadn't meant to actually make the kid _fall_! They were just going to scare him! You know, for kicks! How had this happened? 

Not even the sound of the fight behind him broke his gaze from where it stayed fixed. In fact, it wasn't until one of his goons was thrown down beside him with a bloody nose and a torn jacket, pleading for mercy, that Calvin even noticed that a fight had taken place and finished already.

He felt himself get jerked off the ground by strong hands, and was turned around to come face-to-face with Luffy's big brother.

The rich boy gulped. Ace had quite the reputation around here. None of the other kids messed with him. Not even the teenagers were THAT stupid. Calvin looked past him to see his other two friends scramble up out of the bushes they'd been thrown into (which explained how they'd let Luffy's arm go in the first place) and run for home. The other 'friend' who had been beside him took advantage of Ace's attention not being on him, and also got up and ran.

Calvin was left alone with someone whose match he would never be. They were the same age, true, but Ace -while usually so patient- was a natural fighter, and everyone knew it. …and Calvin had just pushed his baby brother over a cliff.

Ace didn't seem to concerned about this, however, keeping his cool and moving deliberately. Now that young fighter spoke softly for the first time. "I hate people like you, and I don't really want to waste my time…"

Calvin looked up hopefully.

"-but you hurt my only little brother."

Calvin sniffled a little and then started to whimper.

Ace observed the rich boy in front of him snivel and whine for a moment, before giving him one solid punch in the jaw and letting him scramble to join his friends. They were all quick to disappear. He might have done more, but Luffy was picked on all the time and would never grow if big brother was always fighting his fights for him. Besides, Ace had other worries at the moment.

He was at the edge of the cliff like a shot. He hadn't actually seen his brother fall, busy as he had been with the bullies he was disposing of. So when he'd looked up to see the last boy on the ground, transfixed on the cliff-edge with Luffy nowhere in sight, his chest had been hit with a battering ram of shock. The only reason he had kept moving to chase away the last bully was to keep himself from freezing up. He had told himself that Luffy was a creature of instinct, and he was sure to be okay, so that was the reason Ace hadn't needed to look over the cliff right away… but really he was afraid.

He was scared to death to look over the edge for something that might not be there. But with each passing moment as he had dealt with Calvin, Ace's fear had only redoubled. He had to see Luffy again _now_; Luffy _had_ to be there! "LUFFY!"

He dropped to his hands and knees to looked over the side… to see his little brother sitting on a rock far below him, holding tightly to the face of the cliff for dear life. "Luffy!" he called down, "Are you okay?"

"Ace… I'm stuck!" His return call was not as strong as his brother's had been. It was scared, and a little tearful.

Ace felt his own tears of relief well up. _He's okay…_ "Don't get scared, Luffy," Ace called back, "I'm gonna help you get back up here, okay? Don't let go!"

He looked around him frantically for something to help him pull his little brother up to him… but the empty cliff top was kinda coming up… empty. He sighed, trying to keep himself calm. His initial relief at finding Luffy okay (and he used that term loosely) was wearing off fast.

He knew that if he started to freak out, Luffy was lost. The little boy would get scared and fall, Ace was certain of it. He called down again, "Luffy, I have to go get something to pull you up with. I'll be right back. HOLD ON!"

Luffy hesitantly called back, "Hurry, okay?" so focused was he on keeping his grip on the cliff-face. His big brother disappeared.

Luffy kept his attention on holding on tightly. The rock he was sitting on was barely big enough to hold him. He was slowly sliding off of it. Very slowly. He hoped Ace hurried, because he was running out of time.

He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. He believed in his big brother to save him.

He quickly opened his eyes again when a gust of wind almost blew him off the rock. The surface that he was using as a grip to hold himself to the cliff-face wasn't a _real _hold. It was barely a difference in the sheer cliff at all. The winds down the side of the cliff were strong, and went in all different directions. If a gust took him by surprise, he knew he would slip and fall off the rock.

Luffy stayed like this for a while, fearfully clutching to the cliff-face… it seemed like he'd been there foreve-

"AAHHHH!" Luffy screamed as a gust of wind came straight down at him from the top of the cliff and stole his grip from him. He scrambled furiously as he slid down the rock, finally getting a loose grip on the rock itself, his feet finding purchase on the cliff-face below the rock. He finally stopped, wrapped perilously around the front of the small rock like a loose barnacle. "Ace!" he called as loudly as he dared. He tried to quell the sobs of fear that bubbled up from his chest so they wouldn't knock him loose, but he didn't care if the tears blocked his vision at this point. There was nothing to see, anyway. "Nii-chan, please!"

Still Ace didn't come. A flow of quiet sobs welled up. _I didn't even get to be a pirate…! _He took a deep breath and let out another cry, as loud as he could "NII-CHAN HELP!"

"Luffy, you okay?"

Luffy risked another look up when he heard his brother's voice. He wasn't alone anymore… "I'm slipping!" he called back just loud enough that Ace made it out. Now that Ace was back, he could better concentrate on holding on.

Ace could see his brother's change in position, and knew that his ticking clock had just been set ahead considerably. He called back down one more time, clearly and loudly pronouncing each syllable so that his brother wouldn't get scared. "Don't let go! I've got a rope. I'm going to tie it off up here, and then I'm going to drop it down. Understand?"

"Yeah…" the little one called back.

"Don't get scared!" Ace reminded again, and then disappeared.

Luffy sniffled again. "I'm already scared…" he sobbed softly in a whisper. He wanted to look down, even though everyone always said that was a bad thing to do, but he couldn't. His grip wouldn't allow it.

Up on the cliff, Ace looked around for something to tie the rope to. His eyes fell on a big flat-faced boulder.

It would do.

He dropped the coil of rope near the edge where he was, picked up and end, and then ran the ten-or-so yards to the boulder. He carried the rope end around it only once to preserve length, and then tied a sailor's knot out of the rope when he met back with it, so that it was now securely fastened to the heavy boulder. That done, he ran back to the cliff and got back on his belly to see his brother over the side.

The smaller boy had slid a little farther down the rock he clung to. It was hard to say how good a grip that Luffy really had from the angle that Ace was looking at him from, but the older brother would guess it wasn't great. If Luffy's hands suddenly gave way, and he fell into the churning tide beneath him, he was lost. There was no way Ace could get help for him in time, and taking such a jump himself from the top would surely knock Ace out on impact. And that was if he didn't hit one of the crags just under the surface.

"Luffy!" his little brother didn't answer, which was probably for the best, and Ace continued, "I'm going to drop the rope down now, okay?"

Luffy's hopes raised. He was finally going to get up to his brother!

Ace called to him again, "Now, it's not long enough to get all the way down to you, So you'll have to reach for it, Alright?"

Luffy felt his stomach sink even further than it had been. Still, a short rope was better than no rope. "Kay." he called back as loudly as he dared.

Ace dropped the rope. Luffy raised his eyes to look up, but he couldn't see it a little ways up yet… He readjusted his hands a little and looked up further… and then he saw the rope. When Ace said 'not long enough', he wasn't kidding. The rope was almost twenty feet away from him up the cliff, and it seemed higher because of his precarious situation.

He heard his big brother call for him again. "Luffy? Can you find it?"

"It's too short, Ace!" Luffy sniffled in fear.

Ace looked worried, "You have to reach it, Luffy. Come on, now!"

Luffy didn't move to grab it.

"Luffy, if anyone on this ocean can reach this rope, it's you. You can do it now, c'mon!"

Luffy considered his situation again. He sure as hell couldn't stay here… He'd have to do this right on the first try.

Making sure his left hand had a good grip, he cautiously let his right hand let go, and reached up quickly. His arm went about five feet before he brought it back to him to hold the rock desperately again.

Ace called down again, "It's okay, Luffy. Don't be afraid."

Luffy took a deep breath, and stretched again. He had to sort of throw his arm up there -much like casting a fishing line, because he had no real control over it's direction when he moved slowly. His hand reached up as high as it had to… and then snapped back. He'd missed.

"Ace…"

"Luffy, it's gonna be fine!" Ace cried down at him, his own fear mounting. "Trust yourself! Try again."

He did. After a moment of recuperation to become fairly sure of his grip again, he threw his arm up… and missed again.

He tried again.

And again.

And again.

After a fifth miss, Luffy's hands had bled enough to make his last grip on the rock start to slip. They were still wounded from punching the boulder so badly. "Ace, I'm slipping farther!"

Ace was really panicky himself now. Really, he hadn't expected Luffy's aim to be so… nonexistent. The older boy scrambled for anything that might help his brother's focus… and landed on the perfect thing. If this didn't work, then he was going to have to try to climb down -even if it _was_ impossible- and help his brother to the rope. "Luffy, I thought you wanted to be a pirate!"

Luffy, who had been becoming very discouraged, held still now and tuned in better at his brother's words.

Ace could tell that Luffy was hearing him. "You already can't swim, but if you can't grab hold of a rope with them to save yourself, Shanks won't ever take you with him."

Now the smaller boy scowled again. Ace was right. Any pirate could do this, so he had to be able to do it, too! Gritting his teeth in determination, Luffy fixed his grip again in preparation to cast his rubber arm up for what he was determined to make the last time… and his hands lost their grip entirely.

After that, Luffy wasn't sure what exactly happened. His mind froze in fear as he began to fall… and then he abruptly stopped short, and then reversed direction. Looking up, he saw that he had somehow wrapped his fingers around the rope in a death-grip, and his rubbery arm was pulling his body up to follow his hand. He wasn't moving fast, and stopped with a slight bounce, arm stretched to about four feet long, dangling in midair by his life-line. Not one to stay in shock for long, Luffy moved his left hand to join the right as Ace started pulling him up the cliff-face.

He tried to help pull himself up a little, but his hands were slippery and when Ace caught on to what he was doing, he told Luffy to stop wiggling.

After a lot of nervous, steady work, however, Ace finally saw his baby brother's head poke up over the edge of the cliff and gave one last heave to get Luffy's upper body on to the rock. He dropped the rope and wrapped his arms around his scrambling brother's middle to help him up, and together the two ran away from the cliff to the safety of the tree line before Luffy threw his arms around his big brother. "Ace!"

Ace picked Luffy up and held him for a minute or two, before settling him on the ground again and collecting his cool. He hadn't brought himself to let go, yet. He was so relieved he couldn't express it, so he said, "And that's what happens when you ditch chores."

Luffy pouted, and Ace laughed, wiping his eyes and cheeks before Luffy could notice as he unwrapped his arms from the smaller child. "How could you let them corner you like that, huh? You're so much better than them."

Luffy's smile was shaky. "I didn't meant to, I just didn't expect them."

"You were ambushed. It happens to pirates a lot."

Luffy nodded, "I'll do better next time. They won't get me again!"

Ace rolled his eyes, danger unforgotten, but out of the way for now. There was something else he wanted to do with Luffy now, but he had to get him cleaned up first. "C'mon, we're going to Party's. If we ask nicely Makino will clean you up."

"She'll clean me up anyway," Luffy said, "I'm her favorite customer!"

Ace scoffed, "Customers pay. Your just a freeloader."

Luffy huffed, "Am not! I'll pay her back in gold when I get treasure with Shanks!"

"You're still on about that? Luffy you're just not strong enough."

Ace waited expectantly for the comeback that always came at an accusation like that.

When nothing came, Ace looked at his brother. Luffy was looking blankly at the ground. It would have been something to say that he at least appeared angry or disappointed in himself, but there was nothing.

Maybe… maybe what had just happened had made Luffy realize it was true. Or maybe he was just tired. Still… Ace didn't like Luffy looking like his fire had gone out. _We've gotta do something about that_, he thought to himself.

The walk to Party's was a quiet one. It wasn't that it wasn't a peaceful silence, but something was noticeably _off_ about it.

When they got to Party's Bar, Makino stopped tending to fuss over Luffy a little. His hands needed quite a bit of bandaging. No simple band-aid would cover the cuts now that they'd taken so much additional abuse from slipping over the rocks and rope. The Mayor had come in and said that the parents/nannies of three boys had come into his office and filed complaints about Ace starting a fight with them. Calvin's presence had been conveniently withheld.

It took little to make him believe Ace's side of the story, though. The D. family was an honest one, and Luffy was a wreck. He also wasn't talking but to give simple answers. He wouldn't explain his injuries.

So the official story that was given by Ace was that four boys had been bullying Luffy dangerously close the edge of a cliff. They'd hurt him. Ace had come looking for him, seen what was happening, and done what a good big brother always did: beat the living crap out of all offenders so they'd stop. Ace mentioned that Calvin's name, but said nothing of Luffy's fall. That was Luffy's tale to tell, if he ever so chose.

After cleaning and wrapping Luffy's hands, it was Ace took him home. The sun would be dropping soon, but they had about an hour left of daylight before they had to go home and face the music, sowhen their barn came into view, Ace redirected them toward it.

"What are we doing?" Luffy now asked.

"You'll see." Ace answered as he helped Luffy through the fence. The two made their way through the wheat fields that were taller that they were for a while.

When they were maybe half way to the big red building, Ace pushed aside some thicker wheat stalks to let Luffy through and onto a ledge.

Luffy looked in amazement at what was before him. It wasn't too impressive, but Luffy was easily amazed.

Three feet below him was a clearing. The three foot ledge completely surrounded the clearing. It looked like a giant had taken a gigantic Beli piece and pushed it deep into their field and pulled it back out again. Luffy could see a lot of flat rock showing here and there. That explained the lack of planting…

Down in the clearing where wheat did not grow, there was a big boulder sticking out of the side of one of the walls with a red bullseye painted on it, a funny shaped cross made of wood, a wooden horse, a punching bag propped between two rocks against a side, netting pinned low to the ground -probably for crawling under, and a marble ring with a lag line. The broken roof of a shed stuck out of one wall in a place where there were no rocks, with two props helping to support it. Luffy immediately associated that setup with the word 'fort'.

"What is this?" Luffy asked in awe.

Ace smiled. "Like it?" he asked as he helped his brother jump down into the pit that was deeper than he was tall.

"Yeah…" Luffy whispered as he tried to look at everything at once.

"It's my secret place. I made it with dad before he left. Nobody knows about it except you and me."

"Grandpa doesn't know?"

Ace shook his head, "Nope. This's whyI always volunteer to harvest this area. So no one else will find it." Luffy's smile grew. Ace went to sit on a rock and continued, "You can't tell anyone, ever. Not even Shanks, okay, Luffy? And you can't ever let anyone see you coming here. If you get followed, it's over."

"Why are you showing me this?" Luffy asked, turning back to his brother.

"This is where I practice getting stronger." Ace pointed to the rock with the bullseye. "And if you're gonna practice, you should be someplace where you won't be bothered. And where I'll be able to find you easily if something happens."

Luffy was ecstatic. "_Does this mean you're gonna help me practice?" _

Ace nodded. Luffy threw up a loud **_Woop!_**

"Shhh! It won't stay a secret place for long the way you're hollerin' about it!"

Luffy grew quiet and put a finger to his lips. "Right," he nodded with an excited smile.

"Okay," Ace stood and walked over to the target. "I noticed today that the first thing you need to work on isn't your physical strength. It's your aim. It took you too many tries to grab that rope."

Luffy began to huff a little here. He didn't like being told he wasn't good enough, and these ancient secret training grounds (Luffy had a big imagination) had revitalized his desire to be strong right now. "But Ace, I wanna break boulde-"

"We're working on your aim, Luffy! The problem today was that you can't aim, not that you can't break bounders! And I almost lost you because of it. Aim is more important right now. You need that before you can get strong!"

His big brother's words silenced Luffy and brought back a memory of something Shanks had told him when he first ate his fruit. When Luffy stretched for the first time in Shank's arms, the captain and Ben had taken him out of Party's and down to the beach to teach him how his body worked so he wouldn't be scared.

That day, the two had explained to him that being able to stretch far was like being able to lift weights: both types of strength would require a LOT of training and work in order to get to that point where he was as strong as he wanted. That took a ton of self-discipline. To stretch farther, he'd have to try getting stretchier each day.

To try and explain the advantages of Akuma no Mi as being a gift as well as a curse, Shanks had said: "If you want to be able to stretch really far, then you have to work on it every single day. Akuma no Mi gives you a gift, but it's a gift that starts small and grows according to how much the user wants to control their power. Like many things, a person can't truly control an Akuma no Mi unless they can fully understand their own strength and the fruit's capabilities. Start simple and then stretch your limits, Luffy. Strength comes with control. If you make understanding your powers your goal, your powers will become greater with that understanding. Once you have that, you'll be amazed at how much you can do."

Luffy had never really understood what Shanks was saying before; all those words about understanding and control. To understand it, he had to work with it, and by working with it, he'd control it, so he should be able to break big things like rocks, right?

But now Ace was trying to say the same thing; work with him the same way, and what Shanks had been trying to tell him started becoming clearer.

Luffy nodded. Ace nodded. The elder of the two guided the younger to stand right in front of the bullseye. Then they took five steps back.

Ace let go. "Now tag the rock. Try to hit the bullseye in the center. Don't get rough, you're hands will bleed. Try to tag the rock with just your fingertips. That way you won't be working on just how well you aim, but you'll be controlling how hard you hit it, as well." Ace said as he stepped right beside the boulder so he would be able to judge where Luffy hit.

Luffy nodded, and stretched. He tagged right beside the center.

"Try again," Ace said.

Luffy did. He hit it dead on the second time.

Ace nodded encouragingly. "Good, now take three steps back and do it again."

Now seeing the challenge in what Ace was having him do, Luffy rushed to do so. He liked this training. Ace made it like a game! He wished his brother had done this with him sooner.

It took him four times to hit the mark in the center this time, and then Ace had him move two more steps back. And then one step back each time after that, trying to help Luffy understand the limits of his own strength. Luffy could get 13 steps from the rock before he found that he couldn't control _where_ his arm went anymore, and by that time there was already a good chance that he would over stretch and hit the rock too hard, or under stretch and touch his bandage to the dirt for a second on it's way back in.

Luffy was not happy with this, because he could _stretch_ up to 25 steps right now. This meant that all that extra stretching distance was length that he couldn't control.

He wanted to stay out longer and work on his control, but Ace said they had to stop. It was getting too dark to see the bullseye properly and they weren't allowed in the fields at night because the coyotes would hunt jackrabbits in them. Their barn had been attacked more than once in the last month, alone.

"Can we come back tomorrow?" Luffy requested.

Ace smiled. Luffy sounded so eager. Memories of the cliff had been evidently forgotten, though Ace wasn't foolish enough to disregard the possibility of having a certain someone climb into bed with him in the middle of the night. "I think we should find out how much trouble we're in for ditching chores, first."

Luffy drooped. Evidently he'd forgotten that, too.

Ace laughed. His brother was a dunce, no doubt about it, but without him, whom would Ace train for to protect?

* * *

AN: This oneshot has already inspired in me a sequel. I plan to call it "The Fields at Night". Please tell me if you think this earned a continuation. I don't want to waste my time on a plot that's not worthwhile. 

I've earned a place on a few Favorite Author lists. That was so encouraging to me! Thanks you guys! I'm honored.


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